Sociologist and Historian Rodney Stark thinks so:
Go here to read the rest.
Say not the struggle nought availeth,
The labour and the wounds are vain,
The enemy faints not, nor faileth,
And as things have been they remain.
If hopes were dupes, fears may be liars;
It may be, in yon smoke concealed,
Your comrades chase e’en now the fliers,
And, but for you, possess the field.
For while the tired waves, vainly breaking
Seem here no painful inch to gain,
Far back through creeks and inlets making,
Comes silent, flooding in, the main.
And not by eastern windows only,
When daylight comes, comes in the light,
In front the sun climbs slow, how slowly,
But westward, look, the land is bright.
Arthur Hugh Clough
All of this is news to me. I would tend to agree with Rodney in terms the quantity of “believers” perhaps, but question what it is they believe in. In other words, what is the quality their belief. In the Catholic Church, we say that the second largest “religious” group are ex-Catholics, who for the purposes of Rodney’s data, may be considered religious. Bottom line for me: I remain skeptical–but open.
I don’t believe a thing coming out of the post-modern academy or the propagandist media.
Maybe so. Maybe not. The key is how do we put the Muslims back to sleep?
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